{this moment} – A Friday ritual (inspired by soulemama). A single photo – no words – capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. If you’re inspired to do the same, leave a link to your ‘moment’ in the comments for all to find and see.

Although Owen still sleeps in our bed he does indeed have his own bedroom. As it does not get used very often it has been left alone for quite some time with empty walls and bare corners. However, with my nesting instinct in full gear I was feeling it was finally time to make this space special for Owen. The walls in his room are very tall and so I could never picture simply decorating them with paintings or photographs and new some kind of mural would be the way to go. Birch trees are the first thing that came to mind, I played a bit with wanting to add in some animals but finally decided so keep things simple. Birch trees are one of my favorite kind of trees and I was excited to be able to bring a little of the outdoors into our home.

To get started I googled birch tree sencils to get an idea of how I wanted my trees to look as I knew I had many options. I choose a few pictures I liked best and read a blog (which I now cannot find for the life of me!) about what steps to take to paint birch trees freehand and was blown away at how simple it was going to be to actually do this. I was feeling a bit nervous about painting freehand on our house walls, so it was great to see the process broken down into simple steps. I am a painter but painting on our actual walls was really freaking me out. These three easy steps however really calmed me down and reasured me that I could do this without it looking like a total disaster.

Materials Needed:

Roller brush (I used one 4 inches wide)

Different sized paint brushes to paint branches and make touch ups.

Paint and paint tray (Note about my paint color choice: In Owen’s bedroom three walls are of a light blue and one of a darker hue so I simply used the paint leftover from this to create my mural. Using the darker hue of blue paint to paint the trees, this allowed me to use the lighter blue paint to touch up any mistakes I made. This made the whole process incredibly forgiving).

Blue tape

Step One:

Tape off base boards and ceiling in areas you will be painting your trees. Using the roller brush make your tree truck from the bottom to the top of the wall, this could be a straight line or curved, up to you, I choose to do some straight trees and some curved. I also choose not to make all of the tree trucks the same size. To do this I would only press down on one side of the roller brush instead of pressing the entire brush down to the wall. I would then use the smaller sized paint brushes to make touch ups along the sides of the trucks.

Step Two:

Add branches using smaller sized paint brushes.

Step Three:

Using the same color as backgroud wall color (here I used the lighter blue paint) paint lines into the trees to create the look of bark on the trees. Once this step in complete you are all done! Step back and admire your work.

I am really happy with the final product of this project. His rooms finally feels alive and like a fun place to be. As for Owen, he definitely seems happy about this new addition to his room. He’s been pretending to climb the trees and talking about monkeys and owls playing around up in the tree tops. Now I just gotta get Papa to build him some wooden shelves for his books and toys and his rooms will be complete. It took me about a year to get around to this project so lets see how long it will take Papa.

In these past few weeks my belly has been getting bigger and bigger, with that has come some real discomfort. I’m experiencing tense round ligament pain and aches in my lower back while trying to sleep. Also, with these being the last few weeks of my pregnancy I have had birth on the brain 24/7. I’m also in high nesting mode and constantly thinking about how to better our home environment for this new babe and for the birth. With all that in mind I thought it the perfect quick sewing project to make myself a heating rice bag. I think it will be of great help to relax the ligaments around my belly, help me fall off to sleep and also be of great use during labor.

essential oil (I used lavender but some others that may be nice are tangerine or)

12” of 5/8” wide velcro

1. Cut Fabric

two linen pieces; 20” x 9” each

two pieces of fabric which will be on the outside of bag; 22” x 91/2” each

2. Place whatever fabric you chose for outside of bag right sides facing each other and pin together, folding back 1/4” of one of the both back and front of pieces. Press well with iron.

3. Now fold that same edge under 1” and press well with iron. Making sure that both back and front are exactly 1” wide.

4. Turn pieces right side up. Open up the crease that you just ironed (but not 1/4” fold). Center and pin the velcro to the right side of the fabric. Pin the hook piece of velcro to one side of the bag and the loop piece to the other side of the bag.

5. Sew velcro in place.

6. Close velcro and sew around the three sides of bag.

7. Trim seam allowance.

8. Fold velcro edge to wrong side, using your crease as guides of where to fold.

9. Now place linen pieces together (right sides facing each other) and sew together leaving a 3” opening on one of the short sides.

10. Turn bag inside out and it is now time to go get your rice ready.

11. Place 4 lbs. of rice into a bowl, add 7-10 drops of essential oil and stir.

12. Add rice to linen bag and stitch closed. (I shook all the rice to one end and machine-stitched the bag closed, up to you!)

Berry season is on in our little corner of the world and so the other day when I returned home with a box full of blackberries which we picked with some of Owen’s little friends I knew some baking was in order. I’m personally not a huge fan of blackberries, and neither is Owen, a bit too tart for us so I also knew something very sweet would be in order.I had never attempted to make a cobbler before, nor had I really ever had one but it sounded great so I picked a recipe off of cooks.com to try out and crossed my fingers it would taste good. And well it was AMAZING!! I can’t wait to go pick some more berries to try this out again or maybe venture out and try something else new!

{this moment} – A Friday ritual (inspired by soulemama). A single photo – no words – capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. If you’re inspired to do the same, leave a link to your ‘moment’ in the comments for all to find and see.

Once again I was faced with ripe bananas in our fruit bowl this morning. This is a usual happening in our house as we do consume a lot of bananas, but simply not always as fast as they need to be eaten. And so we are often (almost every week!) left with two or three ripe bananas that are simply not too appealing to eat on their own and so I usually resort to making a banana bread. I’ve spiced it up a few times by adding in blueberries or chocolate chips but we’ve been making banana bread so much around here that it was really time to try something new. In plus I was really graving something sweet today. I was actually day dreaming of making vanilla cupcakes with buttercream frosting but new I had to use up those bananas today. And so I found this delicious recipe with a sweet kick. By no means are these muffins healthy, they definitely have their fair share of sugar but hey thats what I was going for! Owen as always had a blast helping me out in the kitchen and had a very hard time waiting for them to be ready to eat. He downed the first one like it was the best thing he has tasted in ages and soon asked for another helping. I told him no more after that however since they really aren’t the healthiest snack, if it was up to him he’d probably have had all 12! He will simply have to wait till tomorrow. Now if your looking to indulge in that sweet tooth of yours but not go all out with cupcakes give these a try; they are delectable!

In a large bowl, mix together 1 1/2 cups flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt. In another bowl, beat together bananas, sugar, egg and melted butter. Stir the banana mixture into the flour mixture just until moistened. Spoon batter into prepared muffin cups.

Finally, this blanket is done! It’s truly a bit embarrassing to admit how long ago this blanket was first cast on to the knitting needles but as easy as this blanket is, it certainly isn’t the fastest to knit. Unless you have oodles of time to simply sit and knit that is. I did try to make it a priority to at least knit a row or two a day but with that sort of rate it takes a long time indeed to finnish this project. None the less I did love this project. It was great to always have a constant easy knitting project to come back to. Something I could work on in the middle of chaos and not have to really think about what row I was on or if there was an increase or slip to make. Nothing but garter stitch row after row and that I found to be very zen; a great way to come back to mindfulness. I loved the simplicity and consistency of this blanket so much that I am yearning to cast on another already…maybe soon!

I found the pattern for this blanket on ravelry and used 100% Peruvian Highland wool by Cascade Yarns in an assortment of colors but what I love about it is that you could really make so many different changes to it so easily; the size, the colors, the pattern of the stripes, they are all up to you! I can’t wait to wrap this blanket around our precious little one’s body as I find it to be the perfect weight to keep a little one snug and warn. Also the rows upon rows of garter stitch really make for a cushiony blanket, perfect for a wee one!

Today my friend Sydney came over to cast my pregnant belly. She also helped cast my belly last time when I was pregnant with Owen. When casting my belly last time, Jenna was there to help us, as well as the boys (Tristan and Sal) to keep us company and take pictures. This time however Jenna nor the boys could be there and so it was just Owen, Sydney and I. Again I found it to be a great experience and a time to slow down and think about this new baby’s arrival. Owen had a great time watching the whole process, giving the baby tons of kisses and showing the baby his dinosaurs. He was also very curious about the plaster itself, we will surely have to do a plaster art project at some point soon. From watching the whole process I think he finally understands what the cast hanging on our wall of him is all about. It’s great to see things come full circle.

Sydney did a fantastic job of wrapping my belly in plaster and I actually found it took less time than when we casted my belly last time, maybe because we didn’t have the boys around to distract us! I did find however that waiting for the cast to dry felt a lot more uncomfortable this time, as did the process of taking the cast off, so possibly we did not use enough vaseline. All I know is that I am happy with the outcome and can’t wait to paint on to this cast and hang it up next to my other pregnant belly. Thanks Syd for helping cast my belly!

So since the last hat I knit I haven’t knit any more (hats that is!) for this fall babe of ours. Instead I’ve been busy knitting hats for other friends that are expect their little ones before us. Now that I’ve gotten all that knitting out of the way my needles were finally cleared for another hat for our very own bundle of joy. I found this yarn sitting around in my stash and thought it was just so soft and lovely for a newborns head and new right away it just had to be knitted into a tiny hat. I don’t know anything about the yarn as it was given to me with a book about knitting and they didn’t provide any information on the yarn or if they did I have far lost that information by now! I didn’t use a pattern, I never really do with hats but if your interested I used US 9 circular needles, cast on 48, then simply knit, knit, knit till I thought the size looked about right for a little new ones head (about 20 rows). To decrease I knit one, knit 2 together for one row then knit 2 together for the rest of the rows till I only had 2 stitches left and then pulled the yarn tail through those and back into the hat. Easy peasie! Now that this hat is off the needles I’ve already started another! I just love knitting baby hats!! So simple and way too adorable on little ones.

For the past month I’ve been buzzing with an erge to craft. Actually I’ve basically been in creative overload over the past month but since I was still tied down with work I was having a hard time getting all my creative energy out. I decided the best I could do till work was out was to write out all my ideas and at best make some quick sketches, and so I did. Last Wednesday was my last day of work and so I am suddenly welcomed by an abundance of free time to craft and make art which actually leaves me feeling a tiny bit overwhelmed. In fact I am now wanting to stay up all night long simply crafting away. I need to try and remind myself that I need sleep, to a) grow this baby and b) take care of my son who still wakes up fairly early. But I am trying to slow myself down and take things one step at a time.

Inspired by a baby pictured online wearing a flower in her hair I knew I just had to make some. I’ve never been interested in making baby accessories before but basically you give me felt and I’ll love the project no matter what. So for the last few days I have been obsessed with making these tiny flowers for babes. Pins, headbands, you name it and I’m creating it. I’ve only finished a handful so far but plan on making many more. Especially since they are so simple and fun to make. Best of all they make great gifts. Now I’ve just got to find myself a little model to show them off.